Do Your Research
by SeptimusMagistos
Summary: A new villain has arrived from afar seeking Link's death.
1. Chapter 1

_I make no claims to the Legend of Zelda._

Somewhere just outside Hyrule there was a tent. It was opulent beyond all belief, made of silk and satin and threads of woven gold. Its walls towered to the height of a tree; one could place an entire house that would be considered large even for a family of four underneath the tent and not come close to filling it up.

The inside of the tent was covered in lush carpets and overflowing in a sea of embroidered pillows. Hookahs and decanters thrust out from that sea like proud cliffs. Oil lanterns, bird cages and strings of beads hung from the distant ceiling.

In the very center, taking up the largest pillow of all, was a man of enormous girth. His long mustache and longer hair mingled in a well-groomed symphony of blue; his clothes were etched in runes and draped in jewels. His small, pig-like eyes held a feeling of deep entitlement and an even deeper desire to see the world bow to his will. He was not a nice man.

What he _was_ was Emperor Itac, a ruler of a far-off land by virtue of his political acumen, his cruelty, and his sheer determination. And what he _held_ was a box of intricately carved ivory, inscribed with a protective seal. With a tremor of effort, Itac forced the box open. Violet smoke billowed from it, coalescing into two figures.

"Hello, my Oracles," Itac smiled through his teeth, rotted with age and sweets. "Which of you shall tell me the truth today and which of you shall lie?"

"I am Parad, the Oracle of Things Looked At From A Certain Perspective. I will always speak the truth," answered the figure in the gold-and-silver costume.

"I am Dux, the Oracle of Things Looked At From A Different Perspective. I have never told you a lie," answered the figure in the silver-and-gold costume.

"We'll see about that. Last month I asked you, as I do so frequently, what was the greatest threat to my empire. Now I ask you the same question again."

"As I told you so I will continue to tell you: your empire is a creation of your own blind ambition and it shall be undone by your own incompetence and paranoia," said Parad.

"I speak as I have spoken before: your empire is a mighty state and it shall be brought down by a hero from Hyrule," said Dux.

"And so I have determined that this time it was Parad who lied and Dux who spoke the truth. And so here we stand, outside of Hyrule's borders. Here to stop the hero who aims to bring down my empire. Now: what is that hero like?"

"He means no harm to you or to anyone else. He is a gentle soul who longs only for peace. His greatest weapon is friendship."

"He is a warrior who fights without fatigue, strikes without hesitation, and kills without remorse. When the time comes, he will destroy you with nary a thought."

"I see. What is the warrior's name?"

"Some call him Grasshopper."

"He is known by some as Don Geron."

"Tell me the truth!"

"Some have called him Mikau."

"Some refer to him as Hero of Time."

The Emperor ground his teeth but then relaxed and chuckled.

"I see, I see. A clever adversary. He hides behind masks."

The oracles twitched; they had quite a lot to say about masks, but they weren't asked a question and so they did not respond.

"What are his powers, then? Answer me, my oracles."

"His strength lies in the force of his arms. His sword and bow have brought down countless hundreds of enemies."

"His strength lies in magic and the blessings of the Goddesses. With their help even the greatest of monsters fell before him."

"No help then. Well, no matter. Even without preparation my henchmen can bring him down. But a few other questions, first. Is he strong?"

"He has no more strength than a normal child."

"He has broken rocks with his bare hands and lifted giant obelisks."

"Is he wise?"

"He has played into the hands of his enemies and acted foolishly multiple times."

"He has a keen and capable mind and knows precisely how to turn his enemies' strengths against them and to take the greatest advantage of their weaknesses."

"Is he courageous?"

"He has no fear."

"He will never back down."

"Well, now. A straight answer. How very refreshing. One last thing: how shall I find this hero?"

"You will know him by his archery. Find the greatest archer in Hyrule and you will find the one who can send an arrow right through your eye."

"You will know him by his music. Find the one who calls forth the most beautiful tunes and you will know the one you've chosen as your opponent."

"I suppose I have it in me to kill an archer _and_ a musician. Return."

The oracles dissolved back into smoke and went back inside the box. Emperor Itac wondered how they felt about the box. He didn't care enough to ask.

Instead he pulled a golden bell with a tongue of diamond from one of his many pockets and rang it once.

A tall man with very dark hair appeared before him.

Iak rang the bell twice.

A woman, all angles and draped cloth appeared before him.

Iak rang the bell thrice.

A short man built like a block of stone appeared before him.

Iak rang the bell four times.

An old, stooped man appeared before him.

"Prang. Oasa. Vehl. Erliol. I have brought the four of you here with me because you are the most loyal of my henchmen and the most powerful ones as well. The four of you have served me since I was nothing but a country noble. You have followed me to the Imperial court and you have now followed me here. Now I bring a new task before you and that task is nothing less than saving the Empire itself, along with my own glorious person. You will listen to what I learned from my oracles and judge for yourself how to separate the truth of what they said from the falsehoods. You will then hunt down the hero from Hyrule and end his threat to my rule."

And the four henchmen nodded. They would do as they were told.

But when they stepped outside they looked at each other and knew they would not work together. For in all the years they worked for Itac, they had never agreed on anything. And so they drew lots to see who would have the first attempt to hunt the hero down.

The winning lot was drawn by Prang. Prang the Weaponsmaster. Prang the warrior. Prang the conqueror. Never before had their land created a killer as ruthless or as efficient as Prang who could run faster than a horse and lift more than an ox and fight with more ferocity than a mother bear protecting her cubs.

"Tomorrow you shall see how things are done," he promised to the others.

And the four of them watched the sun set.


	2. Chapter 2

_I make no claims to the Legend of Zelda._

Prang entered Castle Town with the first rays of dawn, stepping on the drawbridge just as it hit the ground. He looked fierce and dangerous but the guards gave him no trouble. Hyrule's knights were not known for their bravery or competence, or for picking fights when they didn't have to.

Prang did not know much except that he was here to look for someone who was possibly a warrior and possibly a magician; possibly an archer and possibly a musician; possibly a saint and possibly a beast.

Above all else, Prang believed in strength of arms. So he knew, without a doubt in his heart, that only a warrior could be a threat to the Emperor. After all, who but the greatest warrior in the world would have been able to jeopardize Itac's safety in the far-off Imperial court, under the guard of the Four?

And so he went to a place where there were no warriors; but there were various rough types who knew and admired warriors. A loud bar where alcohol flowed like water.

Well, that was what he was expecting, anyway. But this was Hyrule, so the only thing flowing was milk.

Prang did not complain. He drank what he was given, and drank it quickly.

Prang waited until he found a semi-ruffian who managed somehow to drink himself blind on milk. He maneuvered the man into saying a few choice things about Prang's mother. Then, with a smile of triumph, he lifted the offender and threw him across the entire bar to break a table in half with his landing.

"My blood is boiled up," Prang announced. "I need to fence or shoot or throw. Where can I find that?"

And the others, eager to not have him pull a knife or a bow or a bomb in the bar, told him about the town shooting gallery.

Prang went and found it. He accepted without complaint that he was only allowed to use a slingshot. He picked up the unfamiliar weapon and shot every target on his first try.

"A perfect score! Only one person has ever gotten a perfect score before, ever!" cried the shopkeeper.

And Prang knew he had found his opponent.

"Who?"

"Oh, a kid. About yay high, dresses in green. I think he might just be one of the Kokiri."

"I would speak with him. Where can I find him?"

"Oh, he's here and there. Runs around all day helping people. He's a good boy."

"I see."

"He has a house in the Lost Woods. You don't want to go there. Never come out again. But he's bound to get back home eventually, so if you really need to talk to him you'll want to wait at the entrance."

Prang stared at the keeper of the gallery. The man looked kindly and open. He would certainly tell anyone who asked about the time he was visited by the mysterious armed man who got the perfect score. He wondered if that was worth killing over; in the end he decided it was not. Unlike many of Iak's lesser henchmen, Prang took no particular joy in killing. It was a job, just like any other.

Following the advice he had been given, Prang found the hollow log that led to the Lost Woods. Something tugged at his mind, telling him that should he enter he would get a chance to be a warrior among warriors forever. But Prang's discipline was as strong as his muscles, and he stood in place for the rest of the day, departing only to fend off the Peahats roaming in the daylight.

In other parts of Hyrule, Link was playing the part of the hero. Today he delved into the Goron caves to retrieve metals needed by a clockmaker in Castle Town, dove to the very bottom of Lake Hylia to retrieve a dropped coin, gave Epona some good exercise jumping the fences of Lon Lon Ranch, and finally, having accomplished everything there was to be done, he threw his sword into the air and caught it again time after time after time.

At last he headed home. For better or for worse, he was indeed following the most common path into the Lost Woods. Unknown to the gallery keeper Link traveled many alternate routes. On any given day he might dive through the waters near Zora Domain or run through the Goron caves, or simply pop home with a magic melody. On many days he did not return to Kokiri Village at all, preferring to stay closer to the adventures of the outside world. But Prang was lucky; and in that he was unlucky.

Prang naturally knew his victim from the first moment the boy approached him. He had no problem with the fact that Link was just leaving childhood, nor that he still looked childishly adorable with bunny ears plastered over the top of his green hat. Prang had a mission, and he would complete it.

He fell upon Link without a word or a battle cry, drawing his sword of black steel, forged in the fires of a volcano. With speed even greater than Prang's own, Link blocked that blade with his own: a slim, straight, and golden thing. Prang struck again and was blocked again, this time with a shield that held the image of a screaming face.

They settled into a steady fight then. With his long arms and longer blade, Prang had reach going for him. And he was fresh while Link was tired from the day's labors. But Link was able to deliver blows with both blinding speed and power that would put grown men to shame. And it seemed to Prang that his opponent had a truly uncanny sense of timing, parrying every blow and responding with his own in perfect staccato.

Every once in a while Link would roll underneath Prang's thrust. Prang was fast enough to inflict a wound on his enemy each time this happened; but not fast enough to avoid getting slashed in return. Within an hour both of them were covered in gashes, bleeding and slowly weakening. Prang knew that after a lifetime of searching he'd found his match. He knew that if the hero of Hyrule had been fully grown, Prang's own life would end here.

But as things stood, Prang had advantages. Though he had as many wounds as Link and they were just as deep, he had more blood to lose. He was just a bit less weakened than his enemy and he used all of that little bit in one final desperate attack.

With a roar he knocked aside Link's sword, then shield, plunging forward. The boy's blade came back, slashing at his chest, but Prang didn't care. He plunged his own sword into Link's chest, suffering another retaliatory strike and a third before Link finally fell to the ground.

Prang stood back, holding his wounds. That last attack had cost him much. But he was alive now, and if he could bind his wounds and rejoin his compatriots, he might yet survive the day. Most importantly, he had accomplished his mission.

At this moment a fairy extricated itself from one of Link's bottles and flew around him, spending its magic power to bring him back to full health. Its favor granted, the fairy disappeared into the tall grass.

Prang looked on in horror as Link jumped back to his feet and fell upon him with renewed vigor. The effort and pain of the last hour's battle had all been for nothing. He tried to fight back, but against a totally fresh opponent his weakened arms could do nothing.

Then Link spun around, his blade cutting deeper than it had any right to, and Prang realized his chest wasn't exactly attached to his torso anymore.

In his final moments of consciousness, Prang realized his mistake. His enemy wasn't a _warrior_. He was a _hero_. The rules were different for heroes.

Link wiped the blood from his sword and moved on. He was not particularly concerned about his strange attacker, being used to being randomly assaulted by now. The world held many who opposed the light. The encounter had cost him nothing more than a fairy favor, and he knew many places to capture more of the little helpers.

When the appointed meeting time came to pass and Prang failed to show, Oasa, Vehl, and Erliol knew they would not be seeing him again. And thus Oasa, who had drawn the second lot, made her preparations. Oasa, the Emperor's sorceress who had the soul of a spider but the body of something resembling a woman. Oasa who picked minds the way thieves picked pockets and killed without raising a hand. Oasa who was feared even by other dark sorcerers for her cruelty and also for her stealth.

"I will destroy the hero as he is meant to be destroyed," she promised the others.

And the three of them watched the sun set.


	3. Chapter 3

_I make no claims to the Legend of Zelda._

Oasa had no need for tricks or deceptions to learn her target's identity. She simply walked among the people of Hyrule, probing their minds to find the right kind of memories. When she found such memories, she sank the hooks of her magic into them and ripped them out. Then she balled them up and swallowed them, digesting them at her leisure.

Each individual memory was only a little clue. A green-robed figure riding atop a little brown horse; a merry laugh just around the corner; a friendly face and a steady hand at a time of need. But by piecing such clues together, Oasa eventually worked out something like a complete picture. It was Link as others saw him; while questionable for philosophical matters, it fully sufficed for Oasa's simple purposes.

For the next step she snuck up behind a child and caught his shadow with her long, clawlike fingers. Before the little boy knew anything was happening, Oasa had stolen his shadow along with a measure of his vitality. And then she spread that shadow on the ground and pumped it full of people's memories of Link until it looked almost substantial. No longer flat, the shadow stood up and began a staggering walk. Oasa followed it at a little distance, knowing it would seek out the origin of the memories filling it.

The shadow found Link not far from the Royal Castle. Shortly thereafter it found oblivion as Link assumed one of his old enemies had returned. But it didn't matter. The Link-shadow was never meant to fight. Its only task was to follow the footsteps of the true Link, and to lead Oasa to him.

And once she found him, Oasa approached Link, moving as though her legs had been broken and reshaped and then healed time and again. And before he had time to so much as stare at her properly, she left her own body and dove inside his mind.

On the mental plane Oasa could properly be a spider. In this form she always felt more primal, more _raw_ than when trapped within her body made of meat. So even though logic dictated that she should find the fastest way to kill the hero before his mind began to mount a defense, Oasa obeyed her instincts and ambled over to the boy's memories. She would kill him slowly, she decided. She would drain his memories, then his very _self_ and finally crush the empty shell left behind.

She wrapped her legs around the first memory and bit into it, drinking…

… The wailing scream cut through her ears and mind. Her limbs froze and she could do nothing as the ReDead approached. For once in her life she felt what it was like to be helpless.

The undead creature wrapped its limbs around her body, its ashen skin feeling like coarse paper. Its rotted teeth scraped at her face. She felt pain and smelled death and she wanted nothing more than to run…

…away from the memory, as quickly as possible. Skittering and diving, Oasa ran. But in her running she failed to look ahead and stumbled into another of Link's memories. She spooked…

…at the sight of pale, ghostly hands emanating from the floor. The creature in the center of the room was after her and when it strangled her, she would die here among the horrors of the well. She knew that beyond this room were even worse ones. She needed to get…

…away from there and stumble into yet another memory to behold…

…the inside of a Like-Like's stomach, its digestive juices churning all about her as they settled over her face and clothes…

She kept thrashing, crashing into memory after memory, beholding ever new sights, each worse than the other.

…the grinding stone teeth of the Moon as it fell towards he world, as pained as it was unstoppable…

…the visage of a great boar-demon as it raised all the powers of evil just to kill her…

…the taste of poisoned swamp waters as they rushed into her mouth and her lungs…

Terrified and pained, Oasa ripped herself from the hero's mind. She knew it meant admitting failure – something she'd been terrified of all her life. But she knew now that there were far, far worse things to be terrified of. She tried to run and keep running forever, but she was weakened by the exertion and the horror. Her legs wouldn't move when she told them to.

She looked up to see that Link was preparing a spell of his own. It was less subtle than her magics, but it had the advantage of not exposing him to the mind of an enemy. Oasa closed her eyes a moment before the torrent of fire crashed into her. Her body, dry and dusty like a Gibdo's, burned quickly and nearly painlessly. But Oasa had just enough time left to learn to be afraid of fire.

When Oasa failed to return, Vehl and Erliol stared at each other with mixed feelings. Nevertheless, Vehl prepared to take his turn. Vehl the assassin who killed quickly and efficiently, without ceremony or pomp. He waited behind every door and under every bed, a shadow at midnight or just another peasant at noon. He would do whatever it took to reach and kill his target and enjoyed nothing so much as a job well done.

"I will show you how a professional operates," he promised Erliol.

And the two of them watched the sun set.


	4. Chapter 4

_I make no claims to the Legend of Zelda._

The first thing Vehl did was kidnap a little girl. She was to be bait. A lesser assassin might have wasted days learning intimate details about the hero's relationships and who was most precious to them. But Vehl knew better. For a true hero, _anyone_ would do the trick. Anyone at all.

He brought the girl to the top of a waterfall and tied her above the rushing waters, swinging from a single branch. And then he vanished into the bushes with a crossbow and waited in a place that overlooked both the branch and the only path leading up to it.

It didn't take long for something to happen. Maybe an hour later a shadow shot up the waterfall and went against the current. Vehl raised his crossbow but did not shoot. His bolts would not do well at piercing the water. Instead he kept it pointed at the girl.

Two razor-sharp scales emerged from the river. Without thought, Vehl fired his crossbow. The bolt flew straight for the girl's head, but one of the scales met it in mid-air. Cut neatly in two, the projectile represented no further threat. The other scale, meanwhile, cut the girl's bonds, letting her drop towards the swift waters.

In one seamless motion a Zora emerged from the river, diving into the air, grasping the girl and hanging in mid-air just long enough for the dangerous flying scales to reattach themselves, and then plunged into the waterfall, cradling the girl against the Zora body.

Vehl was certainly surprised by the race of his opponent. For one thing, it meant there would be no shooting the hero: the impact with the water's surface tended to leave any projectiles more or less harmless. But he composed himself and shouted over the edge of the cliff.

"There will be more, hero! Follow me and face me, or the next time I will kill someone outright!"

Unlike lesser enemies, Vehl knew that sometimes, if a hero is truly heroic, _no one at all_ would do just as well. So he ran into a maze of stone caves he'd explored in his preparations. Privately he had some hope of not facing the hero at all. The path leading to the cave was filled with deadly traps of his own devising and Zoras, however graceful they might be in the water, were not half so good on dry land.

He was not, however, confident enough to stay out of the caves. Which was really a shame, because otherwise he might have seen a Deku gently floating over his traps. At that point he might have understood the kind of trouble he was in.

Instead he waited behind a corner, wielding a fistful of poisoned needles. Eventually he heard steps and jumped out, jamming them…

…into the rock-hard skin of a Goron, where they broke harmlessly.

Vehl spent just a little too long being shocked by this turn of events. The Goron's fist slammed into Vehl's ribs and threw him across the cave and into the opposite wall, where he slid down, full of agony and broken bones.

Link raised his hand and removed his Goron form. One moment he was a portly stone-like creature; the next he was just a boy in green. It dawned on Vehl that he was paying dearly for failing to do enough research. He had thought that because he understood heroes in general, he could understand any hero in particular. He now knew just how wrong he had been.

Link drew his bow and lodged an arrow in Vehl's chest. Assured of his opponent's death, he left the caves, brooding on the strange attacks of the past days. Once was business as usual, and twice might have been coincidence. Three times in three days was the beginning of a dangerous pattern.

And with his rivals gone, Erliol stood alone. No one knew what it was precisely that Erliol did for the Emperor. But problems had a way of disappearing when Erliol was around, and that's really all that mattered. He achieved results by walking in curves in a world where most others followed straight lines. And so he watched the sunset all alone and in total silence.

He quite enjoyed it.


	5. Chapter 5

_I make no claims to the Legend of Zelda._

Before setting out, Erliol sat down and let three objects drop from his hand:

A hunting glove stained with Prang's blood

A handful of Oasa's ashes

A palm knife once wielded by Vehl

He had followed each of them, silent and nearly invisible; he had watched each of them find the hero; and in the end he had watched each of them die. Slain by sword and by magic; defeated by the friendship of Hyrule's creatures and the blessings of its goddesses. Erliol understood well that should he try to confront the hero, he would follow them into oblivion. So instead he took his perfectly groomed beard and rubbed dirt into it until it no longer looked fine. And he wore a dirty tunic and a wide-brimmed hat and sought out Link.

Unlike the others, Erliol was not starting from scratch. He knew who Link was and where he could be found. But for additional assurance he reached into his little bag and pulled out an ocarina. It had once been beautiful, but he'd spent a long hour whittling all decoration and sheen off it until it looked old and worn, like something that might be possessed by a poor old man. And he played a melody as he traced the steps of Hyrule's hero. And sure enough in time he heard a response. The tune of a second ocarina joined in, coming from the other side of a hill. Erliol hurried to meet his destiny.

And there was the boy. Resplendent in green and as much part of this land as the fields around him, Link played a melody that was sweeter by far than the simple tune Erliol created. Truth be told, Erliol could play much better; but even if he tried his very best he couldn't hope to match this music in quality.

"You are the hero of Hyrule, aren't you?" Erliol asked, as if he didn't know exactly who Link was. "Please, I need your help. My _people_ need your help. And so do yours."

And then he told Link the truth, in incomplete snatches. He told the story of Itac's takeover and the suffering of the people under him.

"Itac isn't satisfied with the territory he has now. He plots to take over Hyrule and reduce its people to slavery worse even than my people's condition. You're the only one who can stop him, Link. You must do this thing for your people and for mine."

On another day this all might very well have worked. But like his comrades, Erliol made a miscalculation. He learned a lot by allowing the others to try and fail against the hero; but he'd also roused that hero to full vigilance. And so it was that Link decided to raise the Lens of Truth to his eye and see what he could see.

Immediately the deceptions and illusions made up of half-truths woven by Erliol so carefully faded away and Link could see Erliol for what he truly was. No ancient and broken peasant was he. True, Erliol was old; but he'd been old for a long time and, if allowed to, would keep on being old even after people who were now in their cribs crumbled into dust. And he wore broken and marred finery that was nevertheless just a little bit different from the possessions of an actual refugee; and he leaned over carefully to make himself seem less fearsomely tall than he was. And as Link beheld the somewhat proud, somewhat cruel, strange old man before him, the honeyed speech faded into a background drone and he could hear the _actual_ truth.

"After you kill Itac there will be a war. I'll make sure of it. And I have aligned myself with all the right factions to ensure that I will be chosen as the new Emperor. Naturally, I won't touch Hyrule while you still live. But heroes die, and one day this land will also be mine."

And Link nodded as though he was still listening to the poor peasant trembling under Itac's rule; and then in one swift motion he drew his sword and removed the liar's head.

Somewhere outside Hyrule a precious bell shattered into pieces no larger than an ant's head each. The great Emperor Itac stared at it and knew that The Four were gone, their lives lost and their mission unfulfilled.

Feeling great fear, Itac lumbered up and reached a horn of brass inlaid with ivory and sapphires. He put it to his lips and blew with all the breath his enormous puffy cheeks could give.

Outside the landscape for hundreds of feet around became dotted with Itac's army. Row after row of soldiers stood to attention. Catapults threatened the enemy from atop earthen fortifications. Many days of travel from his capital, Itac was nevertheless suddenly at the very heart of his power.

And he was still terrified.

"Protect me!" he cried. "Don't you dare let anything happen to me!"

And so when the evening came, ten thousand eyes watched the sunset.


	6. Chapter 6

_I make no claims to the Legend of Zelda._

At the dawn of the fifth day, Link was the one who set out. The hunted had become the hunter.

He had no trouble finding Itac's location, since his army's camp approached the whole of Castle Town in size. But what it lacked in inconspicuousness it made up for in defensive power. Even Link would be hard pressed to take on an army all by himself. And for someone who had never had to sneak through a camp of armed warriors before it would be a problem.

Link was not that someone. He donned one of his many masks of power. This one was wholly unremarkable, and conferred the same status on its wearer. Even someone looking straight at Link saw nothing more than a rock or another soldier or something else that made their eyes glaze over and pass on. Thus it was that he walked in full view of the entire army and passed unnoticed straight into Itac's luxurious tent.

Here he found the Emperor himself. Itac trembled and held a dagger curvy like the ocean wave, sharpened so finely it could wound the very air and poisoned with venom that could melt through solid rock. The Emperor was convinced that he would need it, despite all his guards.

He was wrong. Not because there was nothing to fear, of course. It was because the dagger would not and could not protect him. He found this out when one of the hookahs suddenly knocked the dagger from his hands. And he saw then that it was not a hookah at all, but a boy with a very sharp sword in his hand.

"Oh, you think you've won, don't you?" he screamed. "Well, it's not over yet!"

And then Itac drew a medallion from his neck, snapping the delicate golden chain. And with great force he dashed it against a stone bench. As it shattered, the talisman released a blue-red mist that soon enclosed his body.

Itac grew then. He grew and grew and grew and didn't stop until he was so large that he was wearing his very tent as a hat. He towered over Link and really over all of Hyrule save for the Gorons' mountain which still had a height advantage.

"Do your worst, hero! My empire will last forever! Prepare to die!"

Link donned a mask.

In the process of becoming a hero, Link had to balance his courage, wisdom, and power. Since the courage he'd started in was nigh-unlimited, that took a lot of hard work. He was required to learn wisdom through happiness and tragedy, through understanding the very nature of time and how the smallest of actions at the right moment could mean the difference between happiness and death. As for power…

The battle ended in ten seconds. That was precisely how long it took for beams of raw magical force emanating from Link's sword to bring down the giant Emperor. For all of Itac's tricks, Link wore the face of a god. Just like his henchmen, the Emperor was far out of his league.

For another ten seconds Link and the army performed an impromptu staredown. Everywhere Link's eyes fell, hundreds of soldiers froze and looked down. For the most part they didn't know what to do. The Emperor was gone and his killer seemed unstoppable.

And then two things happened:

First, the giant Emperor's body began to disintegrate into red powder.

And second, the fallen tent was billowed upward by smoke. So much smoke that it almost replaced the fallen Emperor in the sky. And it resolved into two figures, one gold-and-silver, the other silver-and-gold.

Many of those present raised their weapons. The men of the army raised their crossbows and halberds, feeling impotent. Link the Fierce Deity raised his sword, feeling like he could resolve the situation if need be.

"We will not harm you," promised Parad.

"You will not harm us," declared Dux.

That seemed like good news to everyone present. After a few seconds of informal glance exchanging one of the soldiers stepped forward. The fancy uniform showed him to be some sort of an officer – perhaps a captain and perhaps a general. It didn't matter – all that mattered was that he was a leader and he was taking on the mantle of leadership now.

"What happened here?" he asked.

"The Emperor is dead. The Empire is finished."

"The Hero is triumphant. Hyrule lives on."

"Did you engineer this?"

"We merely answered the questions we were asked."

"We orchestrated the entirety of the events in question."

"What do we do now?"

"You can fight the hero of Hyrule and die."

"You may march home and arrive too late to do anything."

"The Empire is doomed then?"

"Definitely."

"Certainly."

The officer turned to his men.

"All right, boys. You heard them. Let's go home and try to remember how to farm on the way. I seem to remember spades being involved, yeah?"

And thus the army began its long march home. Some of the lazier soldiers were beginning to shed their armor. Some of the more industrious ones were picking it up, knowing that Empire or no Empire, a well-made piece of armor would always be in demand. A few of the truly clever ones were plotting to return here once the night fell to plunder whatever was left of Itac's tent. There was a decent chance that some of the lesser magical trinkets still functioned and even if not, there would surely be gold and jewels to gather.

But for the moment the only ones left in the field were Link and the oracles. The latter found themselves feeling very uncomfortable under the former's gaze.

"We are not sorry for what we did."

"But we do apologize."

The gaze continued.

"Well…goodbye."

"Good luck."

And then there was only Link. He would watch the sunset later that day, in the company of good friends. But that would not be until later. For the moment Link was going to get first pick of the plunder. He could always use more magic items.


End file.
